Mel Watt nomination faces long odds

President Barack Obama’s pick of Rep. Mel Watt to oversee Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is winning praise from liberals and brickbats from Republicans chiding the administration for still not having a plan for what to do with the bailed out mortgage giants.

The result: Watt’s nomination is likely to be a casualty of the impasse in Washington over what to do about the future of housing policy.

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On Wednesday, Obama announced Watt (D-N.C.) is his nominee to lead the Federal Housing Finance Agency – the regulator of Fannie and Freddie.

Key Senate Republicans wasted little time in declaring their opposition to the pick, saying no one should be confirmed to lead the regulator until the administration puts forward a detailed plan on what housing finance system can replace taxpayer owned Fannie and Freddie.

“I could not be more disappointed in this nomination. This gives new meaning to the adage that the fox is guarding the hen house,” Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), a senior member of the Banking Committee, said in a statement. “The debate around his nomination will illuminate for all Americans why Fannie and Freddie failed so miserably.”

In an interview, Corker said he doesn’t believe a politician should lead the agency.

“Politics is what led to the ruin of Fannie and Freddie,” he said. “I hope that this is not a sign from the administration that they would move back to the way things were.”

Sen. Mike Crapo of Idaho, the top Republican on the Banking Committee, raised similar concerns.

“By making a political appointment, the President is ignoring the importance that the head of the FHFA must be independent,” he said in a release.

The president could eventually try to put Watt into the job through a recess appointment, but that practice is currently under scrutiny by the courts.

Regardless of its chances, the nomination of Watt allows Obama to address two criticisms aimed at his administration by liberals.

Congressional Democrats and housing groups have been fiercely critical of FHFA Acting Director Edward DeMarco after he rejected a Treasury proposal last year to help struggling borrowers by reducing balances on loans owned or guaranteed by Fannie and Freddie.

For months liberals have been urging the administration to nominate a new leader for the agency and challenge Republicans to block the pick.

“If [Republicans] block this, it’s just an obstruction to progress,” Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley, who along with other Democrat AGs has pressed Obama to replace DeMarco, said in an interview.

While the nomination of Watt won praise from liberals on and off Capitol Hill, it also fell short of their immediate demand that DeMarco be fired.

“Under DeMarco’s leadership, the FHFA has refused repeatedly – often with cold indifference – to work with families struggling to save their homes,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said in a statement. “Families deserve an FHFA that pursues helpful policies like principal write-downs and abandons senseless rules like those that prevent foreclosed homes from being re-sold to their original owners.”